


The Crawl

by gamora (orphan_account)



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe- No Supernatural, Autumn, Fluff, Halloween, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-04
Updated: 2014-10-04
Packaged: 2018-02-19 19:48:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,068
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2400743
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/gamora
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After a horror movie marathon with his brother, Castiel is trying to walk home under the full moon in peace.  Dean, on the other hand, is trying to walk home in pieces.</p><p>Aka; the one where Cas has no idea that there is an organized October zombie crawl going on, and Dean gives him a near heart-attack.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Crawl

**Author's Note:**

> This was based off my own 'autumn au' prompt list, which can be found here: http://caswitch.tumblr.com/post/98336463652/aus-that-need-to-happen-autumn-edition-i-got
> 
> Beta'd by the lovely Amoeba, aka wiccastiel, and Caitlin, aka stormstiel <3

In retrospect, watching a horror movie before walking home at night through narrow downtown alleyways, under a full moon in the middle of October, was probably one of the worst decisions Castiel had made in his life.  Realistically, it was less of a decision and more an unfortunate pile of circumstances that had lead him there.  

The first circumstance was that his beloved 1978 Lincoln Continental was in the auto shop.  It had burst a tire, and upon taking it in, the guy on shift had told him there was actually about seventy-billion problems that Cas hadn’t taken care of, and he’d need to fix them for a few days.  Cas still wasn’t sure exactly how many days that was - he’d been too busy focusing on his lips and eyes and hair to realize he was saying something important.  Still, he left without Hot Car Man’s number, and that was a tragedy in itself.

The second circumstance was that Cas didn’t spend enough time with his family, so when Gadreel called out of nowhere, asking if he wanted to come over for a movie night on Friday, he had absolutely no reason to refuse.  Gadreel had ended up choosing The Conjuring, followed by Pontypool, which proved to be much more terrifying than the name implied.  Cas reminded himself to not go near any radio stations in the event of a zombie apocalypse.

The third circumstance was that, two weeks prior, Gadreel had broken his ankle doing god knows what - Castiel maintained that he tripped down his own front stairs - and could neither drive cas, nor walk home with him.  

Instead of listening to the sounds of his footsteps echoing into the night, Cas had his earbuds in, trying to cheer himself up by alternating between select Elbow songs and Anaconda.  It was oddly comforting when you were scared out of your wits in a dark alley.  

He was approximately fifteen feet from the main road when he began to walk faster.

_“Yeah, he love this fat ass.”_

Ten feet.  

Castiel tried not to imagine that dead-eyed doll Anabelle watching him from behind — waiting.

_“This one is for my bitches with a fat ass in the fucking club.  I said, where my fat ass big bitches in the club?"_

Five feet.  

No need to run.  

Not like you’re being chased by a pack of rabid zombies.

_“Fuck those skinny bitches, fuck those skinny bitches in the club.”_

Castiel rushed out of the alley, turning the corner and immediately coming face to face with a tall limping figure, black goo dripping from it’s mouth, one side of it’s face adorned with gore and blood, and it’s clothes torn in most places.  Fuck — that was a zombie.

To be fair, Castiel had no idea how loud he screamed.  All he heard was Nicki Minaj informing him that she wanted to see all the big fat ass bitches in the motherfucking club.

He stumbled backwards, toppling to the ground and tugging his headphones out with one hand - alright, he was screaming pretty loudly.  Whipping his head to the side, he saw that there were more of them - fuck - _dozens_ of them.  Cas was going to die.  All the zombie movies and stupid survival guides you find on the internet weren’t going to help now.  There was no way he could defend himself against the multitude of them, all groaning and limping and reaching their arms out to offer him a hand and help him up.

Wait a second.

“Dude, calm down, it’s a costume!”  

The zombie in front of him could talk, apparently.  That was new.  

“W-why...”  Cas seemed to be having trouble speaking between the heavy breaths and the urge to pass out.

“Zombie Crawl - we do this every October.  I thought - I thought everyone knew about it, oh man..”  He was laughing now, and Cas almost felt offended.  When you walk around in full zombie costume hissing like the dead, someone was bound to get scared.  
  
“I thought I was going to die,” Cas said angrily as he took the zombie’s hand and allowed himself to be pulled to his feet.  
  
“Yeah, sorry about that.”  

The sea of zombies began to part around them as they stood on the sidewalk.  Cas’ hands had stopped shaking, just a bit.  The guy in front of him then seemed to pause and give Cas a double take. “Wait a sec.  This is gonna sound weird, but...do you have a Lincoln Continental in the shop right now?”  
  
Cas paused for a second.  Zombies weren’t psychic, right?

“Yes, I do,” he answered, narrowing his eyes.  “How did you know that?”

“I’m working on it.”  Cas watched as the man wiped a bit of blood from his cheek, and - oh.  He had freckles.  Hot Car Man had freckles as well.  
  
“You’re Ho – I mean, you’re the guy who’s fixing my car?”  Cas asked, catching himself just in time.  “I’m sorry we have to meet under such odd circumstances.”   
  
“Hey, no problem.”  Somehow his smile was charming, despite being covered in fake wounds and black goo.  

Two other zombies came jogging over to where Castiel and Hot Car Man were standing.  One was a short girl with messy red hair, and the other was a burly guy who reminded Cas of the resident bear at a gay bar he frequented.  Needless to say, they had both gone all-out with the blood and wounds as well.

“Come on, we’re, like, a billion feet behind everyone else,” the girl said, hopping from one foot to another.  “Hurry the fuck up!”  
  
“Oh, if you need to get going, don’t let me keep you,” Castiel said.

 “No, you’re not keeping me,” Dean replied, turning to the others.  “I scared this poor guy half to death.  I think I owe him a coffee.  Why don’t you guys run ahead?”

“But you’ll miss the thriller flash mob – “  
  
“Charlie, come on now, the man wants to have some coffee, ”the other guy said, placing a large hand on Charlie’s shoulder and pulling her back a bit.  
  
“But Benny – !“  
  
“Have fun you two.”  Benny nodded at Dean knowingly, before tugging Charlie away as they headed back towards the crowd of zombies.  
  
Once they were out of earshot, Cas spoke up again.  
  
“There’s no need to console me.”

“I know.  I want to,” he said, reaching forward to shake Cas’ hand.  “I’m Dean, what’s your name?”  
  
“Castiel — or just Cas,” he replied, shaking Dean’s hand.  

Cas liked that name, and it was a lot easier to say than Hot Car Man.  
  
~~~  
  
It took the barista a few minutes to get used to the fact that a man in full professional grade zombie makeup and attire was ordering a pumpkin spice latte with extra whip and a low fat cinnamon hot chocolate.  If she was alarmed by it, she did an awfully good job of not letting it show.  
  
Once they had their drinks, they settled into a corner booth beside the window.  Dean was still wiping the fake blood from his face with a napkin, but he looked significantly more human than he had when Cas first saw him.  
  
“Is it all off?” Dean asked, looking up at Cas with a tiny hopeful expression that was much cuter than it should have been.  
  
“Not quite,” Cas laughed, reaching out and grabbing another napkin.  He reached forward, placing one hand under Dean’s chin, and using the other to wipe a bit of gore from under his ear.  It was only then that he realized the gesture was far too familiar for someone he’d only just met.   
  
“I believe that’s all of it,” Cas said, pulling his hands back into his lap and letting go of the napkin.  
  
“Thanks.”  Dean smiled and looked down at the table.  
  
Oh no.  

He was blushing.  

It was awful.  
  
Cas quickly grabbed his hot chocolate and took a sip, as he hurried to think of an appripriate conversation topic for what was either a friendly outing or an impromptu first date.    
  
“How long have you worked in the auto shop?”  He finally blurted out.  
  
“Three years.  Ever since I got outta’ college.  I’m thinkin’ about opening up my own shop someday, but right now I’m just working for my uncle.”  Dean dipped his finger in the whipped cream and licked it off, the fucker.  “What about you?”  
  
“Oh, I work in an animal shelter,”  Cas said. “It can be stressful this time of year.  We get a lot of injured black cats.  Superstitious people tend to harass them around October.”   
  
“Man, that sucks...That’s cool that you’re there for them though,” Dean said.  “I’m allergic to cats, but I’ve had a dog since I was in highschool.  Her name’s Zeppelin, she’s a sweetheart.”  
  
“I’d love to meet her some time.”  Cas didn’t even realize what he was saying.  ‘Some time’ implied they were going to see eachother again.    
  
“Oh, I’m sure you’d love her,” Dean replied without missing a beat.  “You know, we go to Jackson park every Sunday.  It’s right near here.”  He pointed over his shoulder.  “You should stop by some time.  Maybe I can even buy you a real coffee.”  
  
Cas glanced down at his hot chocolate and smiled sheepishly.  
  
“If I drink coffee now I’ll be awake all night.”  He focused less on the excuse and more on the fact that Dean might _actually_ be asking him on a date.  A second cup of coffee and a walk in the park definitely sounded like a date.  “But I think I might have to take you up on that.  Does this Sunday work for you?”  
  
“This Sunday works great,” Dean said, flashing him a smile that was just a little too warm to be platonic.  “Let me give you my number.”  
  
~~~  
  
Halloween came two weeks after they met each other.  Castiel usually handed out candy, but that year he decided to accept Dean’s invitation to his halloween party.  

He was going dressed as a zombie.  
  
Dean’s house ended up being far more impressive than Castiel had expected — nice lawn, two stories, front steps and everything.  Not only that, but the place was packed with people, spilling out onto the yard.  Cas thought he even might recognize Charlie and Benny off to one side.  Standing next to them was a blonde girl dressed as a sexy nurse, her arm around some guy who wasn’t wearing a costume.  Either that, or he was dressed as the worlds tallest man.  
  
Before Cas had to worry about what to do with himself, he heard someone call his name and saw Dean walking down the steps dressed as Han Solo.  The vest looked quite good on him.    
  
“Hey!” Cas said excitedly as Dean stepped up in front of him.  “That costume looks...very nice.”  
  
“Yours too, man.  Pretty scary.  You’re lucky I’m not screaming right now.”  
  
He felt the urge to say something along the lines of ‘I can have the both of us screaming later on, if you want.  In the end, Cas just nodded and smiled.    
  
“Yeah...lucky.”  
  
“Do you want a beer?  We’ve got tons inside.”   
  
It had been three weeks.  They’d gone on walks in the park, and Cas had been bought what felt like a lifetime supply of coffees, but Cas was tired of stepping around the fact that he really fucking liked Dean, and Dean really fucking liked him.  wanted a lot of things, but a beer wasn’t one of them.  
  
“No, thank you, I’m fine,” Cas said before reaching out and grabbing Dean by the hem of his vest and pulling him in for a slow kiss.  It was nothing fancy, just a soft press of lips and a little sigh, but to Castiel, it was everything.  
  
There were a few whistles and cheers in the distance, which faded out as soon as Dean put his arms around Cas and began to kiss back.  All other noise turned to static.  

The Halloweens before that had been fine, but that night was without a doubt the best  of his life.  He finally got a kiss from Hot Car Man, and was doing something other than watching TV specials and eating the candy he was supposed to be giving to trick-or-treat-ers.  But more importantly, he had figured out what he was doing for the next halloween, and the next one, and one after.

That thing was Dean Winchester.


End file.
